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A first box set containing 16 CDs, presenting more than 40 works and 18 hours of listening, including never released before music by Denis Dufour and texts in a detailed booklet (Fr/Eng/Ger). With his morphological and expressive approach to sound, Denis Dufour works on pieces in a constant state of renewal and on ideas that are specific to each piece. This results to a work looking like a large fresco in which no theme sounds alike, containing varied and breathtaking soundscapes and a patchwork of sounds, thoughts and colors that enable us to appreciate the sheer imagination as well as the consistence of his style. By deliberately but effortlessly opening his music to all sounds, Denis Dufour works with liberty, independence, rigor, and craftsmanship so refined that makes one forget oneself. Every second of sound is wrapped by a conscious ear so that so that his work contains no trace of automatic tools. Composer, teacher, researcher, director of label and festival, Denis Dufour, has greatly contributed to the development of acousmatic art in the world during forty years. First volume of the integral of his acousmatic work, this boxset regroups 44 works of Denis Dufour, composed between 1977 and 2020. Each one of the 16 discs is conceived as a listening program, which provides to listeners an immense landscape. The second volume is expected in 2022, and his instrumental work is under publication as well.

2 vinyl discs with sleevenotes and graphics from the great Dennis Bovell.

Dennis Bovell’s prolific and eclectic career encompasses a huge range of music: from dub poetry to lovers rock to post-punk to disco to pop and beyond. His production work encompasses such diverse figures as The Slits, I Roy, Maximum Joy, Fela Kuti, The Pop Group, Janet Kay, Saada Bonaire, Orange Juice, Golden Teacher, Steel Pulse and more.

This compilation focuses on the period during and immediately after Bovell’s involvement with the Jah Sufferer Sound System, digging deep to find deep cuts and lesser known versions, mainly from 1976 - 1980, plus a killer and lesser heard dub of the iconic “Silly Games”. Painstakingly restored and remastered at Dubplates & Mastering in Berlin so that these decades old tracks sound pristine and dynamic, and sequenced to take the listener on a journey through Bovell’s production and arrangement genius.

The accompanying sleevenotes are a result of a long conversation with Dennis about this period of his life, with track-by-track recollections and fascinating biographical asides. The vinyl and CD versions feature variant artwork, each format utilising a unique photo by Syd Shelton.

Dennis Bovell is a genius who cannot be ignored when talking about British reggae. This compilation of his most core and rare songs from the lovers rock recordings he produced in the 1970s and 1980s is now available on LP for the first time!

Dennis Bovell is a producer, musician and engineer who is indispensable when talking about British reggae. In 2008, P-Vine compiled the best tracks from Dennis' master recordings titled "Reborn British Reggae" under the supervision of Haruyasu Kudo BIG'H, and released "The British Core Lovers" on LP for the first time. This album is packed with recordings that will make any reggae fan drool, including Marie Pierre's lovers cover of the Young Rascals' "Groovin'," a classic that has been covered by many musicians including Marvin Gaye and Aretha Franklin, and was also cut into a 7-inch version!

■Track list

SIDE A:
A1. DELROY WILSON - Hooked On You
A2. THE DUB BAND - Ang Up
A3. JANET KAY - Can't Give It Up
A4. STEVE GREGORY - Sax It Up (Instrumental - Sax)
SIDE B:
B1. DENNIS MATUMBI - Raindrops
B2. DB AT THE CONTROLS - Eye Water
B3. LOUISA MARK - Gone Out
B4. PAUL DAWKINS - To Love Someone
SIDE C:
C1. PAUL DAWKINS - Ready To Dance
C2. JULIO FINN - Nasty
C3. MARI PIERRE - Walk Away
C4. MARI PIERRE - Say A Little Prayer
SIDE D:
D1. MARI PIERRE - Groovin'
D2. ROLAND G - Hear It Through The Grapevine
D3. VIOLA WILLS - Keep On Coming
D4. 4TH STREET ORCHESTRA - Hawaii Five O

Derek Bailey x Han Bennink !!!! The live recording from Incus in 1972, in which Han Bennink, who was personally enthusiastic about coming to Japan this year, also participated, is the first vinyl reissue over 45 years. A collaboration album between Derek Bailey and Han Bennink. Beninck, who makes strange voices and hits things other than drums against Bailey's electric guitar, and messy performances such as turning on the radio, but ... Bailey's calmness and listening. Isn't it a contrast? Sometimes the moment Bailey demands silence is also wonderful. And Rashad Becker's great remastering and perfection at that prestigious Abbey Road Studios.

Another sterling piece of improv history from Incus via Honest Jon’s, this time Derek Bailey’s spellbinding, teetering excursion with legendary percussionist Jamie Muir (King Crimson), who previously collaborated in The Music Improvisation Company. Less jarring, more wildly fluid and flowing into thrilling new spaces, from tribal rhythms to the kitchen sink…

“Percussionist Jamie Muir was a member of King Crimson during the recording of Larks’ Tongues In Aspic, in 1973. Staying less than a year with Robert Fripp, the Scot had already cut his teeth with another master guitarist, Derek Bailey, as part of the Music Improvisation Company, along with Evan Parker, Hugh Davies and Christine Jeffrey, whose eponymous 1970 album was one of the first releases on ECM. Muir and Bailey recorded Dart Drug eleven years later, in 1981.

There’s no shortage of great percussionists in the brief history of free improvised music but on the strength of Dart Drug alone Jamie Muir deserves a place at High Table. Unlike for example Han Bennink and John Stevens, though, you can’t hear echoes of any particular jazz drummer in Muir’s playing, even if he has expressed appreciation for Milford Graves (who himself sounded like nobody else who’d come before him).

What on earth did Muir’s kit consist of? Some instruments are clearly identifiable (bells, gongs, chimes, woodblocks); others could be… well, anything. Old suitcases thwacked with rolled up newspapers? Tin cans and hubcaps inside a washing machine? Who cares? It sounds terrific – but if you’re the kind of person who faints at the sound of nails scraping a blackboard, you might want to nip out and put the kettle on towards the end of the title track.

Dart Drug is consistently thrilling, and often very amusing – but it’s certainly not easy listening. In music we talk about playing with other musicians, whereas in sport you play against another opponent (or with your team against another team). Why not play against in music, too? That’s precisely what happens very often in improvised music, and Bailey was particularly good at it. How can a humble acoustic guitar hope to compete with a Muir in full flight?  Sometimes Bailey’s content to sit on those open strings, teasing out yet another exquisite Webernian constellation of ringing harmonics and wait for the dust to settle in Muir’s junkyard, but elsewhere he sets off into uncharted territory himself.

“The way to discover the undiscovered in performing terms is to immediately reject all situations as you identify them (the cloud of unknowing) – which is to give music a future.” Bailey evidently concurred with this spoken statement by Muir, including it in his book Improvisation.

Derek Bailey is no longer with us, of course, and Muir gave up performing music back in 1989. All the more reason for seeking out this magnificent, wild album.

Very hotly recommended.”

“This is one of those moments that we’re always hoping for, and it's so rare. And it's so hard to talk about, because it's so beautiful. It's like you're seeing some new species of plant that you never knew existed or something.” – Bill Frisell frozen reeds is proud to present the only recorded duo playing of two legendary musical figures. Derek Bailey and Paul Motian – two longstanding pioneers of distinct strains of improvised music – came together for a brief period of collaboration in the early 1990s. Tapes of their two known live performances (one at Groningen’s JazzMarathon festival in the Netherlands, the other a year later at New Music Cafe, NYC) were recently unearthed in the Incus archives, and their contents will surprise and delight fans of both supremely idiosyncratic musicians. The Groningen concert (1990) is released on vinyl, while the New York date (1991) is included with the digital download, free of charge for all purchasers. A conversation between Bill Frisell and Henry Kaiser on Bailey, Motian, their intertwined backgrounds, and the significance of these recordings is included as sleeve-note insert. Each player bringing decades of crucial experience to their encounters – with histories taking in vast swathes of the development of jazz and free improvisation – these fleeting shared moments provide some of the most riveting playing in the career of either. There is precious little recorded evidence of Motian as a free improviser, but his mastery is beyond any doubt in these recordings. From knife-edge precision to textural haze, Motian’s palette is astounding, but perhaps even more impressive is his confidence in the non-idiomatic conversation itself. Pushing far beyond the established vocabulary of free percussion, his playing allows a measured degree of repetition to take form, giving rise to almost song-like structures. The covert influence of the drummer’s work on the post-rock genre (just taking its first nascent steps in the early 1990s) is made overt here. In turn, Bailey allows some of his most unashamedly melodic passages to unfold without a mote of his trademark contrariness or antagonism. Patterns that would be acerbically disrupted elsewhere are allowed to settle, with variations of note and timbre introduced more gradually than is typical of his playing. When forceful changes in dynamics or tone do arrive, they do so in such close tandem with Motian’s rhythmic and textural transitions as to beggar belief. The guitarist’s duos with percussionists (Jamie Muir, Han Bennink, John Stevens…) arguably provide some of the highlights of his discography. ‘Duo in Concert’ represents a strong addition to the list. An elegant sense of construction pervades the sets, as the duo ably fulfil the promise of free improvisation: carving out hugely compelling, expertly balanced, and thrillingly paced music as if from thin air.

Derek Bailey’s incredible debut solo showcase is given a necessary, expanded reissue as part of Honest Jon’s reissue series of important releases on Bailey and Evan Parker’s Incus Records. The original LP of finger-flaying improvisations and Bailey’s takes on works by Gavin Bryars and Misha Mengelberg is now augmented by an extra disc of farther improvs, including a solo show at York University in 1972. The late, great guitar pioneer’s Solo Guitar remains pivotal testament to his endeavours in dismantling modern instrumental music and freeing it to more curious routes of expression, much in key - so to speak - with the US free jazz and improvised music which it evolved from. Love it or not, this record remains a totem of late 20th centre musical exploration. “Recorded in 1971, Solo Guitar Volume 1 was Bailey’s first solo album. Its cover is an iconic montage of photos taken in the guitar shop where he worked. He and the photographer piled up the instruments whilst the proprietor was at lunch, with Bailey promptly sacked on his return. The LP was issued in two versions over the years — Incus 2 and 2R — with different groupings of free improvisations paired with Bailey’s performances of notated pieces by his friends Misha Mengelberg, Gavin Bryars and Willem Breuker. All this music is here, plus a superb solo performance at York University in 1972; a welcome shock at the end of an evening of notated music. It’s a striking demonstration of the way Bailey rewrote the language of the guitar with endless inventiveness, intelligence and wit.”

When Cyro Baptista moved to New York in 1980 from his home city of São Paulo, he brought with him an arsenal of percussion instruments, including the cuica (friction drum), surdo (the booming bass drum associated with samba), berimbau (single-string bow with resonating gourd), and cabasas galore, in the next few years deploying them most notably in numerous ensembles curated by John Zorn, who helped set up this studio session in 1982.
As you might expect from someone whose infectious grooves have graced the work of Herbie Hancock, Astrud Gilberto and Cassandra Wilson, Baptista expertly fires off cunning polyrhythms, even traces of thumping samba, with restless fluency. Bailey the wily old fox skirts and eschews the bait, which is quickly conjured away and newly fashioned. The guitarist homes in on the delicious squeaks of the cuica and the twanging drones of the berimbau with truly awesome tonal precision. You could sing along if you wanted, after a caipirinha or two. And he gets almost as many different sounds from his instrument as Baptista can from his kit – check out the stratospheric plings and string-length fret-sweeps of Tonto, which sound more like a prepared piano than an acoustic guitar.

Wonders abound, from the berimbau/bent-string exchanges that open Quanto Tempo to the delightful collision of howling cuica and spiky bebop on Polvo, and the spare, preposterous Webernian samba of Improvisation 3. These days, ‘improvisation’ often appears without its customary qualifier ‘free’. If there were ever a case to be made for its reinstatement, this album is the best supporting evidence. Freedom means you’re free to get into the groove, free not to, free to play with each other, free to play against each other. Sometimes frustrating, even scary, but more often than not in the hands of these two great masters it’s hilarious, exhilarating and utterly irresistible.

A timeless masterpiece live album recorded by Derek Bailey, one of Britain's leading free improvisation giants, in Paris and London and released on his own label, Incus in 1980, by Honest Jon's with the addition of two unsound sources. The first vinyl reissue!

Just twisting space-time, devilish performances, thrilling moments. Audience alarm? Even if it is interrupted at, it does not bother me at all, and even that is taken in as an element, and there is also a performance that can afford to tighten it perfectly. You can feel some kind of elegance in Bailey's performances that are completely mature. An overwhelming spiritual pressure improvisation sound derived from endless self-questioning and self-answering. 2 additional unreleased tracks are included. If you like music, you shouldn't end up with an unexperienced masterpiece of the century.

It's a special one we're releasing today ! After the RSD we're happy to present you our own exclusive version of DOST 1&2 in two different colours. Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek's Dost 1 & 2 reunited in a unique gold foiled album with an insert with lyrics and pictures ! Such a pleasure to deliver this beauty, especially as Dost 1 was sold out for a long time. And as usual, we're doing it with Catapulte Records ! "Dost" means "friend" in Turkish, a comrade, a brother, a sister and even more than that. The album is an appeal to those who believe in friendship; who believe in Dost.

Big Crown Records is proud to present Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek’s latest album Yarın Yoksa. The show stopping intensity of Derya backed by the psychedelic soul of Grup Şimşek with production by Leon Michels has yielded a stand out record that challenges genre with a broad appeal and a powerful message.

They refer to themselves as “outernational” over international as they say it suggests a sound that’s more inclusive or “beyond borders.” Derya, who sings and plays the bağlama, is German born to Turkish parents. Drummer Helen Wells is Berlin-based by way of South Africa while keyboard player Graham Mushnik and guitar/bass player Antonin Voyant are both French. The collective influences they bring to Anatolian music make for a completely unique and fresh sound that both pushes the genre forward and champions its rich heritage.

Yarın Yoksa which translates to If There Is No Tomorrow delves into deeply personal pain and collective resistance with a central thread of loss, longing, and hope for change running throughout. The lyrics are poetic and rely heavily on symbolic language, metaphors, and storytelling while the music shifts track to track making each tune stand out on its own but work together perfectly as an album.

“Cool Hand”, the first single released on Big Crown in September of 2024, is a beautiful juxtaposition of intensity and lightheartedness over a thoroughly infectious groove. The message is poetic and complicated, repeatedly declaring “I love you, I’m crazy about you” but ultimately finding a sense of peace through accepting a broken heart. “Direne Direne” is a protest song that embodies the struggle and tireless pursuit of justice encouraging people to resist oppression. Derya’s lyrics soar over the psych-soul musical backdrop as her story of personal struggle transforms to a universal call for resilience and strength. The slow and weighty vibe of “Yakamoz” lets onto the meaning of the lyrics even to those who don’t understand Turkish. It is a deeply moving song that captures the profound emotions connected to displacement and loss without knowing if you will ever return. The steady groove of the band, along with the anguished vocals paint a vivid picture of the devastation experienced by the protagonist who ultimately realizes that her roots are within her and anywhere she goes is her home. 

Nine of the tunes on the album are original compositions but they also take on three Anatollian folk songs with their own inimitable approach. The acapella introduction of “Misket”, a folk song from Ankara/Türkiye, will stop you in your tracks. The tune deals with death and how the living cope and continue a relationship with those who have passed away. Another traditional tune from Sivas that they put their signature sound to is “Hop Bico”, a tune about a playful character named Bico who is a symbol of vitality and spirit. The synth intro grabs your ear from the first note and the earworm chorus encouraging Bico to lead the group in celebration and embrace life through dance has the same effect on everyone who hears it.

The band has taken a big step forward that you can hear on this record. Derya’s passion and authenticity is front and center and the music is too moving to deny. Yarın Yoksa is sure to captivate the hearts and minds of all those who hear it, and just wait til you hear them play it live… <iframe style="border: 0; width: 350px; height: 472px;" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=1477941979/size=large/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=333333/artwork=none/transparent=true/" seamless><a href="https://deryayildirimandgrupsimsek.bandcamp.com/album/yar-n-yoksa">Yarın Yoksa by Derya Yıldırım &amp; Grup Şimşek</a></iframe>

Skyapnea’s Giovanni Marco Civitenga - spar of Giuseppe Ielasi as Rain Text - tacks to a sort of illbient dub as Detraex Corp on a fragged-out trip going like a cruddy Wolf Eyes on a hazed jolly.

‘Live at Pompeii’ arrives on the Sagome label after scuzzy aces from The Dengie Hundred and Ssiege with a suitably groggy set of sloshing log drums and briny textures riddled with mycelia-like lines of crooked blooz and jazz. Meditative but not boring, it finds Civitenga hitting a new sort of hobbled stride on nine asymmetric, peg-legged grooves that may take a minute to lock into, but once you’re in there it flows with a naturally offbeat, downtempo quality that's really a mark for seekers of a certain grungy sound.

It’s a grotty pleasure to follow this one for stumbling rhythms and laid-back styles of no-wave steez in procession from the gasping lurch of ‘Tykes of’, thru the squashed drums and 4th world wooze of ‘Myth Prism Strip’, to the squirming jazz spectres on ‘Bullet Holes’, right down the rabbit hole into swilling skronk of ‘Channel 83’ and Werkbund-esue enigma of ‘Mount Point’.

Dettinger’s Intershop and Oasis have long been held, by many fans of ambient and electronic music, to be some of the finest albums in their field. Produced by the mysterious Olaf Dettinger, about whom not much is publicly known, they were some of the earliest full-lengths released by the then-nascent Kompakt, and in many ways, they both articulated and defined the sound that would come to be known as Pop Ambient, while also existing, somehow, to the leftfield of any clearly recognisable genre. Beautiful, sui generis works, it is a rare pleasure to see them being reissued on vinyl for a new generation of listeners to embrace. Originally released on CD only in 1999, Intershop was Kompakt’s first artist full-length. The music here simmers and broods, with opulent banks of tone marking out territory for rhythms that seem to be built from the clacking detritus of technology – hisses, thunks, knocks. Bass is deployed carefully, each drop a dubbed-out depth charge; drones spin and spiral, warping and weaving between the beats. Oasis, released in 2000, refined the palette that Dettinger had explored on its predecessor. A blurred crusade of ambient texturology, its unassuming patterns, and subtle, incremental dynamics, admit to real beauty, and a kind of abstract sensuality that you don’t often experience with music that is, perhaps, similarly tooled, but not as poetic. Through seemingly simple gestures – whether lushly expansive repetitions, hyper-acute tremolo tones, or ear-tickling rhythms – it builds complex emotional resonance. It’s no surprise to discover Oasis is held in high esteem by artists like Panda Bear of Animal Collective, who once said of Dettinger, “For us, he was the dude.” There is, of course, other music to know Dettinger by, too – his three excellent EPs for Kompakt, Blond (1998), Puma and Totentanz (1999), the latter of which, Michael Mayer once argued, “invented dubstep.” There is also a small, yet graceful run of compilation contributions, many of which can be found on Kompakt’s Total and Pop Ambient series. All this music has plenty to recommend it, sharing a clarity of purpose, and a rare, human warmth and depth. But Intershop and Oasis are the releases that distil Dettinger’s singular vision, and allow him, should he wish, to claim his place as a modern master of ambient and electronic music.

Dettinger’s Intershop and Oasis have long been held, by many fans of ambient and electronic music, to be some of the finest albums in their field. Produced by the mysterious Olaf Dettinger, about whom not much is publicly known, they were some of the earliest full-lengths released by the then-nascent Kompakt, and in many ways, they both articulated and defined the sound that would come to be known as Pop Ambient, while also existing, somehow, to the leftfield of any clearly recognisable genre. Beautiful, sui generis works, it is a rare pleasure to see them being reissued on vinyl for a new generation of listeners to embrace. Originally released on CD only in 1999, Intershop was Kompakt’s first artist full-length. The music here simmers and broods, with opulent banks of tone marking out territory for rhythms that seem to be built from the clacking detritus of technology – hisses, thunks, knocks. Bass is deployed carefully, each drop a dubbed-out depth charge; drones spin and spiral, warping and weaving between the beats. Oasis, released in 2000, refined the palette that Dettinger had explored on its predecessor. A blurred crusade of ambient texturology, its unassuming patterns, and subtle, incremental dynamics, admit to real beauty, and a kind of abstract sensuality that you don’t often experience with music that is, perhaps, similarly tooled, but not as poetic. Through seemingly simple gestures – whether lushly expansive repetitions, hyper-acute tremolo tones, or ear-tickling rhythms – it builds complex emotional resonance. It’s no surprise to discover Oasis is held in high esteem by artists like Panda Bear of Animal Collective, who once said of Dettinger, “For us, he was the dude.” There is, of course, other music to know Dettinger by, too – his three excellent EPs for Kompakt, Blond (1998), Puma and Totentanz (1999), the latter of which, Michael Mayer once argued, “invented dubstep.” There is also a small, yet graceful run of compilation contributions, many of which can be found on Kompakt’s Total and Pop Ambient series. All this music has plenty to recommend it, sharing a clarity of purpose, and a rare, human warmth and depth. But Intershop and Oasis are the releases that distil Dettinger’s singular vision, and allow him, should he wish, to claim his place as a modern master of ambient and electronic music.

Limited Blue Seaglass Wave Translucent Vinyl edition. singer-songwriter Devendra Banhart, who is known for his work at Meditations best-selling compilation 'Fragments du Monde Flottant', and who is a great admirer of esoteric studies, oriental music and Haruomi Hosono. Devendra Banhart, a singer-songwriter, and Noah Georgeson, a producer and friend who has produced many great works together, recorded and completed their ambient albums separately during the pandemic. The work began while recording Devendra Banhart's album "Ma" in 2019, and was put together with friends in 2020. An idea that had been brewing since they first met, and now, after over 20 years, has finally taken shape and been released as a necessary part of the current era. It's quintessential that they express their own sensibilities to the fullest while showing strong influences from their predecessors in new age music such as Henry Cowell, Lou Hudson, and Pauline Oliveros! This compassionate, meditative piece of work, with its like Zen quality, will be a beautiful "refuge" as the title suggests.

Can you believe it? Devendra Banhart's Cripple Crow - originally released by XL in 2005 - is turning 20 years old. This was the 5th album from the Venezuelan American artist who is considered the pioneer of the "Freak Folk" and "New Weird America" movements. To celebrate - Devendra has compiled a reissue of the out of print release that features a 3rd Bonus LP (on Clear Green Smoke!) featuring 9 bonus tracks, including 1 B-Side, 5 previously unreleased demos, 2 previously unreleased live tracks, and 1 unearthed smash hit from the recording sessions. This release is the first on his newly created Heavy Flowers label.The album received a "Best New Music" 8.4 review from Pitchfork upon its release. The release date will fall 1 day prior to the actual 20th Anniversary, which will be the first time Devendra is early for anything. Now THAT is something to celebrate!

“…his raw songcraft is terrifyingly effective at communicating the breadth of human emotion… beautiful,damaged,naked and utterly compelling.”- THE WIRE “The quaver in Mr. Banhart's voice is as shaky as his songs' connection to everyday reality...his songs and fragments ponder animals, apparitions, logical leaps and childlike certainties, all with credible eccentricity.”- THE NEW YORK TIMES #2 ALTERNATIVE ALBUM OF 2002 “It's been awhile since an obsessive, naïve, utterly original musical visionary…emerged from a private sanctum into the embrace of the rock cognoscenti. But we've got one now.” -THE LOS ANGELES TIMES

Devo's Hardcore documents the group's beginning as pre-punk outcasts in the fertile Akron, Ohio underground rock scene. Spawned at the nearby college of Kent State, site of the infamous May 4 Massacre, Devo formed as a conceptual art project armed with a radical philosophy of de-evolution. Brothers Mothersbaugh (Mark, Bob, and Jim) and Brothers Casale (Jerry and Bob) along with drummer Alan Myers soon whipped-up an otherworldly brand of "devolved blues" that could hold its own alongside the beatnik groove of 15-60-75 (aka The Numbers Band) or the primal rock poetry of the Bizarros. Recorded on various 4-track machines and in tiny studios, basements, and garages between 1974-1977, Hardcore reveals their strikingly clear vision: rock n' roll stripped bare of its collective cool and jerked back into propaganda fit for post-modern man. It's no surprise that these transmissions would soon catch the eye and ear of Brian Eno who later produced their landmark 1978 debut album. Noisy synth, strangled guitar chops, and a primitive rhythmic thud power the early Devo sound. Threaded beneath it all are lyrical themes of post-McCarthy paranoia, middle-class ephemera, and Devo's long-running topic of choice: sex, or lack thereof. Volume 2 digs further into the band's cranial bunker with the caveman hit "Be Stiff," the space age surf-blues of "Clockout" and even a demented take on bubblegum pop, "Goo Goo Itch." This 2xLP set includes four previously unreleased tracks: "Man From The Past," "Doghouse Doghouse," "Hubert House," and "Shimmy Shake." Superior Viaduct and Booji Boy Records are proud to present Devo's Hardcore to a new generation of spuds, lovingly packaged with Moshe Brakha's stunning cover photography. As David Bowie said in 1977, Devo is indeed "the band of the future."

Devon Russell pays homage to Curtis Mayfield on these ten remakes recorded in the early '80s. A favorite among Jamaicans, Mayfield's songs translate well via Russell's crusty falsetto. The title track, a speedier, bouncier "We the People Who Are Darker Than Blue," one of Mayfield's most introspective songs, stands out, as does the frenzied, up-tempo, positive "Move on Up," which utilizes the engaging horn arrangement and ultra soulful bassline that made the original irresistible. But the title track is just too short -- Mayfield's mantle piece off his first solo album was a marathon-length fist pumper. Russell does justice to both "Never Too Much Love" and "The Makings of You." Curtis Mayfield and old-school reggae fans will find these interpretations pleasing. ~ Andrew Hamilton

Devon Russell pays homage to Curtis Mayfield on these ten remakes recorded in the early '80s. A favorite among Jamaicans, Mayfield's songs translate well via Russell's crusty falsetto. The title track, a speedier, bouncier "We the People Who Are Darker Than Blue," one of Mayfield's most introspective songs, stands out, as does the frenzied, up-tempo, positive "Move on Up," which utilizes the engaging horn arrangement and ultra soulful bassline that made the original irresistible. But the title track is just too short -- Mayfield's mantle piece off his first solo album was a marathon-length fist pumper. Russell does justice to both "Never Too Much Love" and "The Makings of You." Curtis Mayfield and old-school reggae fans will find these interpretations pleasing. ~ Andrew Hamilton

Dewa Alit, Bali’s master of contemporary Gamelan composition, returns to Black Truffle with Chasing the Phantom, presenting two recent works played by the composer’s Gamelan Salukat, a large ensemble that performs on instruments specially built to his designs, using a unique tuning system that combines notes from two traditional Balinese Gamelan scales. Alit explains that the ensemble’s name suggests “a place to fuse creative ideas to generate new, innovative works” and both compositions demonstrate the composer’s ability to wring stunning new possibilities from variations on the traditional Gamelan ensemble. While using familiar elements of Balinese Gamelan music, such as unison scalar melodies and stop-start dynamics, Alit’s music is overflowing with harmonic, rhythmic, and timbral inventions, the latter often facilitated by unorthodox playing techniques. “Ngejuk Memedi”, an English translation of which gives the LP its title, results from Alit’s reflection on the complex relationship between tradition and modernity in Balinese culture, particularly in the way that belief in the phantoms or spirits known as ‘memedi’ are shared through social media using digital technologies. Embodying this uncanny co-existence, the opening passages of the piece are at once immediately recognisable in their use of the metallophones of the Gamelan ensemble and strikingly reminiscent of electronics in their timbre and movement. At points, what we hear seems to have been fragmented with digital tools, or even to originate in some incessantly glitching DX7. Short melodic figures loop irregularly, with the ensemble splintering into polyrhythmic shards before unexpectedly recombining for intricate unison passages. After several minutes of this manically tinkling metallic sound world, the metallophones are joined by drums for a meditative passage of lower dynamics, as the uniformly high pitch range explored in the opening sections gradually opens up to include resonant low gong hits. Recovering some of the manic energy of the opening, but now enhanced with the full range of percussion, the piece weaves through a series of tempo changes to a stunning passage of rapid-fire melodies and ringing chords that sweep across the metallophones, their unorthodox tuning creating complex clouds of wavering harmonies. “Likad”, written during Covid-19 lockdowns, channels anxiety and uncertainty into musical form, resulting in a piece that, even by Alit’s standards, is stunning in its complexity and the virtuosity it demands of Gamelan Salukat. Its opening section is perhaps most remarkable for its mastery of texture, with rapid transitions between dry, muted strikes and metallic shimmers calling to mind the use of filters in electronic music. At points, the complex irregular repetitions of short melodic patterns, where the music seems to get stuck or be suddenly interrupted by a skip, recall the mad sampler works of Alvin Curran or the skittering surface of prime period Oval more than anything familiar from acoustic percussion music. Moving through a dizzying series of twists and turns, the piece ends with a majestic sequence of chords possessing an almost hieratic power. A major statement from a radical contemporary composer, one cannot help but agree with Alit when he sees Chasing the Phantom as an answer to the “question of the future of Gamelan music”.

Black Truffle announce Genetic, the first release outside Indonesia from contemporary Balinese composer Dewa Alit and his Gamelan Salukat. Alit is a major force in contemporary Indonesian music, presenting his work extensively throughout Asia, Europe and North America and collaborating with renowned ensembles such as Bang On A Can and Ensemble Modern. Involved in the composition and performance of works for Gamelan ensemble since he was a teenager, in 2007 he founded Gamelan Salukat, a 25 member ensemble that perform on instruments specially built to Alit’s designs, using a unique 11-note scale. The single composition that unfurls over the two sides of Genetic is an enchanting introduction to Alit’s magical sound world. Beginning with a stately procession of isolated, hanging chords sounded on the ensemble’s uniquely-tuned metallophones, the piece abruptly launches into a stunning passage of rhythmically complex call-and-response motifs, making striking use of abruptly muted chords – one of many moments where the acoustic ensemble sounds uncannily electronic. The piece continues to alternate between spare investigations of resounding tones and sometimes frenetic ensemble interplay using unorthodox techniques, including a stunning moment around half-way when the entire Gamelan seems to transform itself into a single, gigantic zither. Later in the piece, drums and wind instruments enter, and the metallophones begin to play virtuosic, rapid-fire passages of fragmented scalar melody. As Alit explains in his liner notes, the music of Gamelan Salukat is grounded in the tradition of Balinese Gamelan; however, he approaches this tradition not as something static, but as a set of concepts and principles that can be used to create something radically new. For many listeners, Genetic will inhabit precisely this space between the familiar and the invigoratingly unheard, as it takes the stop-start dynamics, unison melodies, and much of the instrumentation familiar from traditional Balinese Gamelan and puts them in the service of rhythmic, harmonic, and timbral experimentation, crafting a work possessed by at once by mysterious grandeur and a joyous volatility.

Space funk from keyboardist Dexter Wansel, originally released in 1976. Sampled by DJ Shadow.